With all the bad news we’re hearing about climate change, a lot of us may feel compelled to do our part for the environment. Yet, while some energy-saving tips are relatively easy, others can range from expensive to requiring a degree of sacrifice.
And sometimes, that sacrifice can come in forms that are both surprising and harder to accept than we might expect.
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And one artist’s clever invention hits some of us right where it hurts.
When we take a shower, it’s pretty easy to get lost in the relaxing warmth of the water raining down on us.
This is especially true if we get into a groove and start our day by rocking out.
If you’re like me, the idea of starting “Bohemian Rhapsody” without making it to that final “nothing really matters to me” is just unacceptable.
However, getting comfortable for too long while the Spiky is in play will make for one jarring performance with no encore.
Designed by an artist named Elizabeth Buecher , this special shower curtain will sprout up spikes if the shower it’s guarding takes longer than four minutes.
And no, I can’t really say I’m in love with that time frame either.
But desperate times call for desperate measures, and since Buecher submitted this as part of a series called “My Shower is a Green Warrior,” it sounds like a watered-down solution wasn’t going to cut it.
Of course, the “spikes” aren’t actually meant to hurt anybody who goes over their four-minute time limit.
Instead, they inflate to a large enough size to take up all of the room inside the shower so that trying to stay in just gets awkward and complicated.
Although that covers the general idea of how this device works, it still leaves a few unanswered questions.
According to The Daily Mail , the curtain “knows” to expand thanks to a sensor in the tap, but it’s unclear whether it resets on its own once the shower is over.
It’s also unclear what you’re supposed to do if you need to wash your hair.
You also might have noticed that there’s no information telling you where you can get once of these if it really appeals to you.
And unfortunately for any green warriors, that’s because it’s not available as a commercial product.
Buecher told HuffPost that she’d love to make it into one, but that probably won’t be for a while.
At the moment, Spiky exists just as an art installation for museums and public and private collections.
So unless you often leave the house looking like this, you likely won’t have a chance to use it.
Instead, Spiky is supposed to encourage discussion about water issues and make us aware of how much we use every day.
After all, not only does losing track of time in there make us late, but it makes us waste water.
As Buecher told HuffPost, “I do believe that it is very hard to do things that feel uncomfortable even if it is for our own good, [like] saving water, and we need a little help to force us to do it.”
h/t: Elizabeth Buecher
